UDOO retail line up consist of three models that share most features with just slightly differences in term of connections and CPU power. All the three models features an embedded Arduino compatible board based on Arduino DUE schematic. UDOO’s size are 4.33 inch x 3.35 inch (11 cm x 8.5 cm).

UDOO retail line up consist of three models that share most features with just slightly differences in term of connections and CPU power. All the three models features an embedded Arduino compatible board based on Arduino DUE schematic. UDOO’s size are 4.33 inch x 3.35 inch (11 cm x 8.5 cm).

Revision as of 16:22, 17 July 2013

UDOO

This page collects information about UDOO www.udoo.org the first ever small sized computer that merges in one single board an ARM cortex-A9 iMX.6 CPU and an Arduino compatible board embedded with a dedicated ARM SAM3X CPU. UDOO project has been funded trough Kickstarter, rising $641,614 in sixty days thanks to 4,172 backers.

Notice: The UDOO Wiki pages on this site is collaborative work - the UDOO team is not responsible for content on these pages.

What's UDOO?

UDOO is a mini PC that could run either Android or Linux, with an Arduino-compatible board embedded. It is a powerful prototyping board for software development and design, it’s easy to use and allows to create projects with minimum knowledge. UDOO merges different computing worlds in one; each world has its strengths and weaknesses, and all of them are useful today in education as well as Do-It-Yourself (DIY) and rapid prototyping endeavours. UDOO is an open hardware, low-cost computer equipped with an ARM i.MX6 Freescale processor for Android and Linux, alongside Arduino DUE’s ARM SAM3X, both CPU integrated on the same board!

UDOO goals:

Develop an innovative product for a growing market

Give a new vision to the educational framework: the idea is to train up a new generation of engineers, designers and software developers skilled in digital technology: physical computing, multi-media arts, interactive arts, IoT...

Specifications

UDOO retail line up consist of three models that share most features with just slightly differences in term of connections and CPU power. All the three models features an embedded Arduino compatible board based on Arduino DUE schematic. UDOO’s size are 4.33 inch x 3.35 inch (11 cm x 8.5 cm).

Tutorials

Creating a bootable Micro SD card from image

This guide will allow you to create a bootable micro SD card for your UDOO board using an image file. The image file contains the UDOO Operating system, which runs the i.MX6 processor. Without the O.S., you can only use UDOO like a normal Arduino DUE (only SAM3X processor).

Using an image is quite simple: you need to unzip the image and write it to your SD card using the dd tool for UNIX/MAC users or Win32DiskImager for Windows users. It is not possible to create a bootable card with drag and drop. Please note that the micro SD must be at least 8GB; bigger memory cards may be used but only 8GB will be available at the end of the procedure.

Extract the .img file from the .zip file you downloaded into a folder of your choice (this path will be referred to as <img_file_path> in the guide).

Follow the instructions below for the OS you use:

Write the image on micro SD card Using Linux:

From the terminal run

df -h

If your computer has a slot for SD cards (SD to Micro SD adapter needed), insert the card. If not, insert the card into an SD card reader, then connect the reader to your computer. Note: must be formatted in FAT32!

Run again

df -h

The device that wasn’t there previously is your Micro SD card.

The left column gives the device name of your Micro SD card. It will be listed as something like “/dev/mmcblk0p1″ or “/dev/sdd1″. The last part (“p1″ or “1″ respectively) is the partition number, but you want to write to the whole micro SD card, not just one partition, so you need to remove that part from the name (for example “/dev/mmcblk0″ or “/dev/sdd”) to work with the entire Micro SD card.

If your Micro SD card contains more partitions, you should unmount all of these partitions (using the right name found earlier followed by the letters and numbers that identify the partitions) using the command:

e.g. sudo umount /dev/sdd1

Write the image into the Micro SD card using the command:

sudo dd bs=1M if=<img_file_path> of=/dev/<sd_name>

Make sure you replace the input file if= argument with the path to your .img file, and the “/dev/“ in the output file of= argument with the correct device name (this is very important: you will lose all data on the hard drive on your computer if you get the wrong device name). Make sure the device name is the name of the whole Micro SD card as described above, not just a partition. (e.g. sdd, not sdds1 or sddp1, or mmcblk0 not mmcblk0p1)

Once dd completes, run the sync command as root or run sudo sync as a normal user (this will ensure the write cache is flushed and that it is safe to unmount your micro SD card) and then run:

sudo umount /media/<sd_label>

Your micro SD card is ready to be used. Just insert it in UDOO and boot the system.

Write the image on micro SD card Using Mac OSX

From the terminal run

df -h

If your computer has a slot for SD cards (SD to micro SD adapter needed), insert the card. If not, insert the card into an SD card reader, then connect the reader to your computer. Note: must be formatted in FAT32!

Run again

df -h

The device that wasn’t there previously is your Micro SD card.

Remember the device name of the filesystem’s partition, for example, /dev/disk3s1. Using the device name of the partition work out the raw device name for the entire disk, by omitting the final “s1″ and replacing “disk” with “rdisk” (this is very important:you will lose all data on the hard drive on your computer if you get the wrong device name). Make sure the device name is the name of the whole micro SD card as described above, not just a partition (for example, rdisk3, not rdisk3s1. Similarly you might have another SD drive name/number like rdisk2 or rdisk4, etc. recheck it by using the df -h command both before & after you insert your micro SD card reader into your Mac if you have any doubts!):

e.g. /dev/disk3s1 => /dev/rdisk3

If your micro SD card contains more partitions, you should unmount all of these partitions (using the correct name found previously, followed by letters and numbers that identify the partitions) using the command:

sudo diskutil unmount /dev/disk3s1

Write the image into the Micro SD card using the command:

sudo dd bs=1m if=path_del_file_img of=/dev/<sd_name>

Make sure you replace the input file if= argument with the path to your .img file, and the “/dev/“ in the output file of argument with the right device name (this is very important: you will lose all data on the hard drive on your computer if you get the wrong device name). Make sure the device name is the name of the whole micro SD card as described above, not just a partition (for example, rdisk3, not disk3s1).

Write the image on micro SD card Using Windows

Unzip it and now you have a new folder called “win32diskimager-v0.7-binary”

If your computer has a slot for SD cards (SD to micro SD adapter needed), insert the card. If not, insert the card into an SD card reader, then connect the reader to your computer. Note: must be formatted in FAT32!

If the micro SD card (Device) you are using is not found automatically then click on the drop down box on the right and select the micro SD card letter you just plugged in (e.g. [H:\]). Note: must be formatted in FAT32!

Be careful to select the correct drive; if you get the wrong one you can destroy your data on the computer's hard disk!

In the Image File box, choose the .img file that you downloaded and click “Write”. Note: if a warning message appears click YES.

Your micro SD card is ready to be used. Just insert it in UDOO and boot the system.

Creating a bootable Micro SD card from the sources

The following are instructions for a Linux system. A different way to create a bootable SD card is to compile the sources.

A bootable SD card has 3 different elements:

File System (Ubuntu Linaro, Yocto)

Kernel

U-Boot (Universal Bootloader)

The following are the required steps to create a bootable SD card starting from the sources and using an unformatted SD card:

Once completed these steps in “udoo-dev” you should have 3 binary files: File System, U-Boot and Kernel (in case you downloaded the Kernel compiled binary), while you should have 2 binaries: File System and U-Boot plus 2 folders containing the Kernel sources (from the github link) and the cross-compiler.

Press the green V form, wait for the partition to be done and exit gparted.

Copy the file on Micro SD card

File System. Move Inside udoo-dev and extract the tar.gz file containing the filesystem inside the Micro SD with the following command:

tar -xzvpf <NAME_OF_TAR_FS> -C /media/<UDOO_MICROSD_LABEL>/

(This operation could take up to 30 minutes)

Kernel. Move inside the folder where you previously downloaded or compiled the uImage file and copy the binary inside the Micro SD boot folder using the following command:

sudo cp uImage /media/<UDOO_MICROSD_LABEL>/boot

U-Boot. Move Inside udoo-dev and copy the u-boot.bin file inside the Micro SD with the following command:

sudo dd if=u-boot.bin of=/dev/sdc bs=512 seek=2 skip=2

(NOTE: Be sure you’re using the correct label otherwise you could lose data on the hard drive on your computer if you get the wrong device name)

Unmount the partition you previously created using the following command:

umount /media/<UDOO_MICROSD_LABEL>

The Micro SD card is ready, you can now insert it on UDOO and boot the system.

Programming the Sam3x

In order to upload sketches to the SAM3X, the flash memory needs to be erased before being re-programmed. While Arduino DUE uses an ATmega16U2 microcontroller to perform this procedure, UDOO uses the iMx6 processor which is directly linked to the erase and reset pins of the Sam3x managed during the program phase.

There are 3 ways to program the Sam3x processor: With an external PC/MAC using the mini-usb cable connected to the CN6 port without any mirco SD inserted; Using the mini-usb cable connected to the CN6 port with mirco SD inserted and OS booted; Directly from UDOO under Ubuntu OS.

NOTE: At this stage the only way to program the Sam3x is to manually erase and reset the processor (method number 1):

With an external PC using the mini-usb cable connected to the CN6 port without any mirco SD inserted

Using this method the iMx6 processor doesn’t boot any kernel or file system. UDOO is used as a simple Arduino DUE.